"The Use of Knowledge in Society" is an academic paper written by economist Friedrich Hayek, that was first published in 1945. At that time a clear counterargument to a planned and centralized economy, it is more actual than ever!

"In the absence of evidence that increased trading led to either better prices or better risk sharing, we would have to conclude that the finance industry's share of GDP is about 2 percentage points higher than it needs to be and this would represent an annual misallocation of resources of about $280 billions for the U.S. "

"Russian stocks advanced more in price than American stocks between 1864 and 1914, but American companies paid larger dividends. Price and dividends offset each other and during that 45-year period, the two stock markets provided approximately equal returns."